Burma’s Chin Christians face persecution in Buddhist Na Ta La schools

CALCUTTA—A reformist government may have replaced the military dictatorship in Burma, but that hasn’t stopped the persecution of ethnic minorities, according to human rights groups.

U.S. President Barack Obama’s historic visit to the country in November highlighted the decades-old plight of the Muslim Rohingya minority, and recent reports show that Christians — largely found in Burma’s Chin state — have also been subject to religious persecution.

At the heart of the issue are 29 special schools run by Buddhist monks and known locally by the acronym Na Ta La (for Border Areas National Races Youth Development Training schools).

A 15-year-old Chin boy who ran away from a Na Ta La school last year spoke to the Toronto Star about the abuse.

“My head was shaved and I had to wear monks’ robes after school hours. It was the rule for all 15 (Christian) Chin pupils in our class,” said the boy, who along with his parents fled recently to India’s Manipur state. “Sometimes some among us refused to memorize Buddhist scriptures and bow down before Buddhist monks. Then we were caned.”

The Na Ta La schools, which function outside the mainstream education system, are run by the Ministry of Religious Affairs and the military-dominated Ministry of Border Affairs. All pupils must study Buddhist scriptures, along with regular school subjects.

Because fees for mainstream schools are expensive, many struggling Chin families seek out the Na Ta La residential schools, which, apart from providing almost free food and education, guarantee government jobs for the students once they graduate.

Chin Human Rights Organization (CHRO), which is based in Nepean, Ont., recently published a 162-page report called Threats to Our Existence, which details the role played by Na Ta La schools in forced assimilation, as well as other stories of persecution of Christians in Burma.

In 2010, headmaster of a Na Ta La school in Rangoon told his

Chin pupils that “if you don’t want to be monks, you have to join the military,” according to the report.

“On the pretext of providing free education, the Na Ta La schools force the poor Chin children to convert to Buddhism,” said Rachel Fleming, CHRO’s advocacy director. “It’s part of the government’s vision for nation-building, which is predicated on the slogan ‘To be a patriotic Burmese citizen is to be a Buddhist.’ ”

Since the opening of Na Ta La schools in the mid-1990s, they have converted some 1,000 Chin to Buddhism, according to activists.

About 90 per cent of Burmese are Buddhist, but about half a million Christians live in Chin state, on the border with India. About 90 per cent of the population of Chin state is Christian.

To escape abuses under the junta in the 1980s, the Chin began fleeing to India’s northeastern state of Mizoram. Today, around 110,000 Chin refugees live in India. Another 50,000 have fled to Malaysia.

New Delhi-based CHRO activist Van Hmun Lian said that forced labour, forced conscription, physical abuse and extortion continue to push Chin people to flee the country.

“Security forces and other officials have begun destroying Christian crosses, desecrating churches and are often not allowing religious assemblies,” said Lian. “By forcing the Chin children to convert to Buddhism, they have taken the religious persecution to a new level.”

One Chin girl told CHRO that after she ran away from a Na Ta La school in Mindat last year, the school monks came to her house with some soldiers looking for her.

“They told me, ‘You have to return to school or else you will be forced to join the army.’ I was sick,” she said. “I realized that as long as I was in Burma, the soldiers would trace me. So I had no choice but to flee the country.”

The 20-year-old now lives as a refugee in Malaysia.

Salai Za Uk Ling, program director of the CHRO, said the discriminatory institutions and practices of the military regime continue to persecute the Chin.

“President Thein Sein’s government claims that religious freedom is protected by law, but in reality Buddhism is treated as the de facto state religion,” he said.

Mark Farmaner, head of Burma Campaign UK said that Burma appears to have made it a state policy to eliminate its ethnic minorities if they cannot be assimilated.

“The persecution of Christian Chin is just a different branch of the same tree which leads to persecution of the Muslim Rohingya,” said Farmaner. “It stems from the government’s nationalist belief in Burma Buddhist superiority over other races and religions, and this is the root cause of conflict and dictatorship in Burma.”

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom Report 2012, released in July, documented the situation of religious rights in Burma during the previous year. It said there are still restrictions on worship by the non-Buddhist minorities.

At the end of October, the Burmese government announced it would open another Na Ta La school in Paletwa Township, which also has a Christian majority.

The move is “a clear sign that the Burmese government intends to continue its policy of forced assimilation under the guise of ‘development’,” said CHRO’s Fleming.

Shaikh Azizur Rahman is a freelance journalist.